


Mercury

by Stormslostradiant



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: But only bits and pieces., Canon Trigger Level Assumed., First two tags are unrelated., Gen, Just read., Psychological Ickiness., Still not horror though., Stockholm Syndrome, The tags make it sound worse than it is., Which might just be more disturbing than the graphic version., non-graphic cannibalism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-20
Updated: 2016-07-05
Packaged: 2018-06-03 11:08:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 17,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6608389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stormslostradiant/pseuds/Stormslostradiant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I go by many names, and many people curse them all. I can’t claim to be a hero or bathe in infamy. I can’t claim to be nice, or to be cruel. At the time I did what I thought was best, and in this blood drenched world I lost a bit of myself every step down this long path. Judge me, I ask of you: judge this mortal human. Coward, I may be – afraid I never was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Everything has a silver lining. Even in the depths of war, covered in the blood of others, man has always found its silver lining. For me, it’s the chance to appreciate that which was so blurry in my sight before. I wonder sometimes if it is not the threat of death that first makes one feel alive.  
For me, it gives every second a startling clarity, every word and expression an invisible weight I would never have seen before. Death makes me honest.  
I can’t claim to be afraid. I do not know by whom’s grace I still walk this earth, or if there is even someone to thank.  
It’s the year 843, and I have two years left to live.

Melanie Alert, cousin of Armin Alert spent most of her days helping in her mother’s farm or running after her siblings.  
If asked, most of her acquaintances would describe a young girl with an open face and the saddest eyes ever seen on a child.  
Her brothers Frank and Moritz could tell you more.  
They’d tell you about how she would often stand and stare at the wall, a sad, wistful smile on her face. They’d tell you about the many stories she knew; about the books she wrote.  
If you asked her classmates, they would describe her as rather distant and also very uncaring about her future.  
Her parents had organized a marriage for her, with a boy named Erich Langert, the son of a miller. It’s after 45 is all she ever said when asked. It doesn’t really matter.

Afterwards, when she stands at the docks in Trost, a look of surprise on her face; all the people who could have talked about her were dead. Only she remained.  
Melanie herself could not understand. She hadn’t wanted to survive – not really. Fourteen years of life had been all she had been given, she had thought. Fourteen years to stare at a blue sky.  
...............  
She could still remember the first time Frank carried her onto the frozen river to skate. He’d be nineteen now, she thought.  
At the time she’d been six and he’d been a beanstalk-like 11. He’d whirled her around until she was dizzy and laughing. They’d done choreography for their parents that winter.  
She and Franz had always danced together, some dances she taught him, some he taught her. She’d sing and he’d laugh, and they’d often get scolded for running around barefoot in the snow.  
Franz had always been her partner in that, open for comedy and tragedy.

Moritz was three years younger than her, and a real adventurer. He’d always leave the moment he had finished with his chores and often only come home when the sun had set.  
He was the one she could dream with, could talk about things from beyond the fourth wall with. They’d fight dragons together; him in her lap doing shadow puppets on the wall.  
He was the one she told the bitter stories to, about the highs and lows of humanity. He had been her listener, who understood.

Her father was a shadowy figure in her mind. He worked hard, and believed hard. He wasn’t irrational, per-se, but he stuck to his guns. He was the man she could count stars with, with whom she could talk about the practical things – who wouldn’t get bored of repeated inquiries. He was the man who believed in a future and in her. He carried her pride.  
But he also worked hard for them, and as such she never saw him much. He was the foundation she stood on.

Her mother was a different creature entirely. A romantic. She didn’t dream like Moritz did, or dance in emotion like Franz: she believed in the simple world; in love, in fate. She was the one who knew what everyone did, who saw what and who was trouble. She managed the house and still never seemed busy. She was her teacher, and her hope.  
She was the one who smiled and never saw the bad side, she was her strength.

Melanie held her worldly possessions in a bag against her back. It was dark, and the stars painted the sky like glitter. It’s a sight she didn’t think she will ever truly get over. The rest of Trost was painted black, only the occasional night guard with a lantern cutting through the dark.  
It was a decision that had been coming for a while now.  
In less than a year, the massacre expedition to regain Maria would take place. She’d already planned on dying once: now, she had nothing left to brighten her internal darkness. She did not plan on dying again.  
She knew: surviving SnK only had a probability of 70%, not including death from things other than Titans. Wall Maria had easily contained half the population, as well as a large chunk of the farming. Sina would only be able to feed Rose for a week: Sina and Rose only managed to feed Maria for a few months of starvation.  
It left her with very few choices. In Trost, she could starve or sell herself. In Sina, she’d be on the run and stealing. In Maria she’d have plenty of food for a while, but she’d have to evade Titans. And Rose was almost as bad as Trost.  
That left the Underground, which didn’t have the overpopulation problem but did have food shortage like everywhere else.  
It galled her that the only way to survive was to let 20% of humanity die.  
Then she froze. Wall Maria had more outer districts than just Shinganshina, and while it was true that Shinganshina had its gates kicked in, nothing spoke of the other districts.  
Maybe she could get somewhere. She’d need a fast horse, and 3DMG training: but perhaps such a thing would be manageable. She would only need to reach wall Maria.  
She bit her lip and thought.  
Levi joined the Survey Corps in 844, so last year. That meant Isabel and Farlan were dead. Would the three have left their gear behind when they left?  
It would mean gambling on Levi not cleaning something up.  
Short of joining the Corps, she had no better idea.  
She grimaced. This hung on way to many ifs, and if she was wrong, she’d end up stuck Underground or on Wall Maria.  
With a sigh, she spread her blanket on the floor, mumming herself in another. She made sure the coarse wool diffused her body shape and covered her head. Then she gripped a knife and lay down to sleep.  
Unlike almost everyone else, she’d packed before fleeing. She had no money: she’d given that to her brothers. Her mother and father had split the jewellery. She’d grabbed a knife, a few blankets and a bit of food. The family horse she’d cut loose, and she’d opened the pens. She’d also dumped all the hay they had to a level where the animals could eat it. The rest of the family had run long off, taking the mules and the village horse carriage. She felt proud of how calmly their village had evacuated: the children and Franz on the carriage, and everyone else on whatever horse they had.  
The last thing she’d done before leaving was hand everyone who’d had to stay behind a mix of herbs that would hopefully blunt pain as much as possible. She had such a bag herself, but decided not to take it. Instead she’d cut the dog loose, and headed for the wall. Her mother had shoved a small wooden box into her hands before leaving, but she still hadn’t looked inside.  
She shivered as a wind blew by, disturbing the leaves on the dirt path. Soon it would be too cold to sleep outside.  
....  
Somewhere only blocks from where Melanie lay curled up, a blond boy sat huddled between his two friends. His Grandfather was out for work and would only come home later.  
They sat in silence, as they had the months before. None of them really knew how to break the black despondency that had blanketed Mikasa, or how to stop the rage from consuming Eren.  
Armin himself clutched the page he had ripped out from his favourite book before they had left. It hung in his hand like a dead leaf, and he wondered if he wasn’t being selfish, wanting to see the ocean. He shivered and pulled a blanket over his shoulders.  
Eren frowned at the fire, feeling empty for once. These days that was all he felt, empty and angry. He would kill the titans for what they took from him, for the hole in his heart. They would pay. Dimly, he noticed Armin shivering, and scooted a little closer. They wouldn’t take anything more from him. He’d kill them all.  
Mikasa just stared blankly at the wall, a hand wrapped in Eren’s scarf. Somehow she felt if she let go, she would fall apart or disappear. Since her parents died, Eren had become the centre of her world. She’d protect him from the world, from the death. People died around her, she could deal with that. Eren shouldn’t have to though.   
None moved when the door creaked open and Armin’s grandfather walked in. Mikasa let her eyes flick over once, just to assure herself of the man’s identity, before returning.  
Grampa let tired eyes sweep over the three children that had seen too much, and felt a dead weariness settle in his bones. He couldn’t help these children, couldn’t stop the sadness from eating himself out. All he could do was give them a little food.  
Food was running out though, and soon he would be forced to leave and die outside the walls. At least then there would be food, he told himself. At least they wouldn’t starve.

Melanie let her teeth rip into the last bit of bread in her satchel. Food was running out, and it was time she made a decision. In a month, it had been declared, the expedition to reclaim wall Maria would leave from Trost.  
In a year, her cousin would be joining the 104th. In four Trost would be hit like Shinganshina was.   
In a month, her grandfather would be dead.  
She hadn’t looked for her family much. She knew they were still alive and had seen Eren, Mikasa and Armin in the distance once, buying bread. She still was unsure some days whether she shouldn’t join them instead of going on a manic race for the walls, but she’d somehow survived ‘45, and she had no intentions of dying soon. Survey Corps was synonymous to death.  
Sometimes she wanted to tell herself that she could use the training, and then just grab the gear and make a break for it; but she knew that wasn’t in the books. She’d be known, and chased; and then she’d be a deserter.  
None of her wanted to be hanged.

The day Mark Alert left to die out in the Titan infested lands of Maria, Melanie finally packed her things and started looking for the trio. She found them that same day, shivering in the cold and asleep. She carefully unfolded one of the blankets and draped it over what was left of her family. Then she sat down, holding vigil until the sun peeked over the horizon. She left before the three stirred, leaving the blanket and a letter with Armin.  
Then she started walking.  
“Dear Armin,  
I don’t know if you remember me. It’s your cousin writing, Melanie. I wish I could help or do more for you: but the last of my spare blankets will have to do. My food ran out yesterday, so I need to move. I have a plan, don’t worry.  
Eren, you probably haven’t heard of me before; but I have advice for you. Don’t be afraid. No matter what happens, you are you and that will never change. Remember who you fight for and what you are trying to accomplish. Keep an eye on Armin’s health for me, will you?  
Mikasa, a word of caution is all I have for you. There are elements out there that would more than anything else like that which cannot be forgotten. Remember your parents, but hide. Please, don’t let Eren drown in anger, or Armin in grief. And Mikasa: not all allies are nice, or friendly or even good.  
Armin, my advice to you is simple. You have something very few are blessed with these days. You have a brain. The harsher reality becomes the harder it is to cling onto dreams. But dreams let us see over the grime to the horizon. Don’t let go. Of all of us few Humans that are left in the walls; you can see the clearest. Don’t let time take that away from you.  
Armin, I don’t know if you will meet me again. I’m going after two rumours. If I’m right, someday maybe we will stand on Maria together. If I’m wrong, wish me the best – I don’t know what I’ll do then.  
And Armin: I have three riddles for you to remember. Burn them afterwards.  
A girl is called princess, is a bastard that may be queen.  
When Trost falls, three are enemies.  
Titans are Humans, Beast makes it spread.

Armin, they’ll make sense in time.  
Little cousin; no matter what you decide to do, stay alive if not safe.  
Your Cousin.”

It was going to have to be enough; the last time she interfered with canon. She’d finally made up her mind: it was time to head underground.  
.....

It was that time when the last rays of sunlight made shadows flicker and faces grotesque caricatures of reality. The last guard of the day stood dead on his feet as he stared dully out onto the road into Trost.  
In a few minutes the shift would change, and he could already feel his eyes slipping shut from tired tedium.  
Wreathed in a dirty brown cloak that dragged on the floor, Melanie stood in the shadows of one of the houses lining the road. She watched as the new guardsman approached from the left, light from his lantern blinding him to the shadows. He held a flask to his lips, eyes semi-shut from drunken stupor.  
The Guardsman at the gate let his eyes catch on the lantern, blatant relief on his face. He breathed in to call out to the other, and in the shifting shadows of the lantern light, Melanie slipped through the gate and under the wall. She let her hood slip down, hair dyed gray from muck black in the night. She nodded to the guard on the other side: passing through unquestioned.  
She forced herself to walk, head held low until she reached the first side street. She slipped in and then started breathing heavily. Thank god that worked.  
She had a feeling that getting into Sina would be a lot harder.  
She walked past an inn, untying one of the horses as she went. She’d need one to get to Sina in any kind of sensible time. A hand on its head and a murmured word assured its compliance and then she was off, walking through the streets with the horse trotting behind her. Once the last of the houses had disappeared over the horizon, she slipped onto the horse’s bare back and gripped it’s mane with both hands. For the first time in a long while, she was glad that they’d been too poor to afford a proper saddle. It didn’t take much coaxing to have the horse at an easy trot towards Sina.

The first time she met Armin, he was three and a bundle of curious joy. He’d reminded her of a kitten with how he’d ask questions without end. She’d indulged him where the others hadn’t and had spent quite a few hours just explaining the world. She’d met her grandfather then too, although only at a distance.  
Eren she had come to know much later, on her third visit to her grandparents. Eren and Armin had been friends, and had played with each other. Armin had someone to talk to in the boy who suffered from similar curiosity. She’d taught them both their letters, and Armin his first few sentences. When she left, she’d given Armin a notebook of Grimm’s tales that she had cobbled together from memory.  
That had been the last time she had visited.

Wall Sina came into view a gruelling five days later. She’d had to swap horse twice along the way and hadn’t slept a wink. She knew she must’ve looked a fright but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Now that she had a goal, she was going to have to get used to sleepless nights anyway. The road from Rose to Maria was a lot longer than that from Rose to Sina.  
She cut her current steed loose a few miles before the Gate-town to Hermiha, deciding to walk the last stretch. She still needed a plan on how to cross through Hermiha into Sina. Somehow she didn’t think it would be as easy as leaving Trost was.  
The sound of jumping gravel warned her of a carriage approaching from behind. She respectfully slid to the side of the road and then looked back.  
It was a large carriage, with the symbol of one of the noble families printed on the sides. They had no guards, she was stunned to see, beyond the Military Policeman sat Shotgun.  
For a moment, she contemplated highway robbery: but again, the whole point of this was getting to Maria without anyone knowing she was missing. That didn’t stop her from taking a running jump onto one of the beams the spare horses were usually tied to. She’d cut her horse free to try and smudge the path of the horse thief, not because she was looking forward to the last leg of the trip.  
It didn’t take long for the horse drawn carriage to reach Hermiha. She jumped from her perch when the first houses came into view and then calmly walked. First, she needed to inspect the security at the gate. That was best done by night, so she found herself a hidden corner to doze in.  
Later, she would blame her lack of sleep for that particular stupidity.


	2. Chapter 2

When a hand grabbed her by her hair, and heaved her up until her feet don’t touch the ground, it was old reflexes that jumped for the knife in her belt that wasn’t there. It was new ones that told her screaming would only attract more vultures in a world where the military had no laws against violence.   
Her eyes snapped open and it took just a minute to register female before her hands and feet were moving, one hand crushing the arm holding her up and the other headed straight for one of the woman’s eyes.  
When her face showed no reaction to the pain of getting a nerve crushed and the other hand was caught by that of a heavy set man; she realized just how fucked she was. The foot she had lifted up in preparation to kick dropped down again.  
Now she took a moment to actually look at the two crowding in her personal space and winced.  
Both wore Military Police uniforms, and both weren’t too happy.  
She had fucked up, and fucked up bad.  
“What do we do with this one?”  
The woman took a hold of her chin and squinted.  
“She isn’t from around here.”  
The man cursed.  
“I really don’t want to hunt down some runaways parents.”  
The woman looked slyly to the side.  
“Then leave this to me. I know someone who’ll take her off our hands.”  
The man hesitated.  
“Don’t worry, they aren’t illegal.”  
A grunt, and then the man grabbed her wrists and tied them behind her back. Melanie let it happen, hair hiding her eyes. In a way, this was a lucky break – they wouldn’t report her if they wanted to hand her over to someone. Now she just had to wait for the right moment to run again.  
.......  
She took her to a portly man in a circus tent, just minutes away from Hermiha. The man eyed her in a way that made her want to curl up, and a deal was struck.  
He took her in.  
Her first months were a blur of beatings, long hours stuck chained to a cage and long hours listening to the Circus Master talk. She hated the talks the most.  
The man never belittled her; in fact, he asked her opinion and treated her well. He was the man who gave her food and discussed things with her. He was kind, and some days she’d almost believe it; until he returned with a cane or a belt and made her back bleed.  
Stockholm syndrome, she had to remind herself more and more often. That’s what he’s waiting for. Stockholm syndrome.  
The day she told him about Frank, and Moritz, and only realized hours later what she’d done – she knew she was lost.  
She wasn’t surprised when the beatings stopped and he had others begin to teach her. Leopold taught her acrobatics, Marco taught her knife throwing, Susie taught her magic.  
And the circus master taught her animals.  
The circus had two wolves, a bear and a Lynx. They had – no: the circus had, she had to remember the distinction – five horses and about ten performers, most of which were acrobats.  
She didn’t know how long she spent with them, except that the year came and went and they travelled most of Rose.  
She’d early on realized that her conditioning made it impossible to run. She’d tried, oh had she tried: but every time her own conscience forced her to turn back. Some days she would sit up on the roof of the caravan and stare at the stars, wondering what her father would think of what she had become: a slave to a circus master tied with the shackles of her own mind.  
She never truly gave up; she would spend hours each day trying to undo the brainwashing, telling herself again and again to just leave.  
Then things came to a head when their ¬– the circus master’s, she had to remember – circus was invited to perform for one of the noble families in Sina proper.  
Suddenly, the urge to leave was back.  
It was still hard, and it still made her feel guilty like nothing else, but each day she walked a little further away from the camp site. Some nights, when she hadn’t talked to the master – the circus master, she had to remember – in a while, she would be able to stay away until the first rays of light shone into her eyes. But every minute was a fight, in the end, with hands clawing at wooden posts trying to stop her feet, and the thoughts in her head whirling like kaleidoscopes.  
They performed often, for the family, as often as twice a day sometimes, and with every performance the duke’s eyes lingered longer on her. She was fifteen, and she looked fifteen. The rest of the circus kept uneasy eyes on the circus master.  
Melanie heard things, on her nights out. She sometimes drank with the men in the pub, or played poker in the gambling parlour. Her memories from before made it easy to feel at home with the dregs of society and made it easy to mingle.  
When the Circus Master told her to go with the noble, she wasn’t surprised. She couldn’t stop herself from leaning into the hand caressing her hair or falling for the sadness in his voice when he claimed that there was nothing he could do.  
She knew it was a lie, but some part of her couldn’t help believe anyway. She hated Stockholm syndrome.  
She wasn’t surprised when, instead of to his bed chamber, the man led her down and down and down, straight to a pit with stands, straight into the SnK version of the coliseum.  
That night in a different cage, she fought the urge to run away, to run back to that circus master. Morning found her clinging to the bars; face slumped with streaks from crying.  
She wanted to leave; she needed to go back to the – no! She didn’t! She needed to return to Maria, ok? Maria not the cir – oh god she couldn’t even force herself to think it.  
She needed to get out of here. She refused to think any further. She needed out.  
The guard chuckled.  
“Win and we might let you leave – loose and you die.”  
She was going to win.


	3. Chapter 3

She stood opposite a man wearing plate armour, holding a sword. She’d declined what they had offered her: instead opting for a thin sharp wire and skin tight leotards.  
She had to win.  
She ducked under the sword and used the man’s momentum to carry herself over his shoulder. The wire was loose in her hands, and she pulled. Wire dug angry crescents into her flesh and then it was over.  
She had won. There on the battlefield, a smile spread itself across her face. She ignored the pain in her hands and the stain on the floor and the gurgling sounds behind her. She had won; she was one step closer to being free.  
Then, in the cell, she made the mistake of looking at her hands.  
There were deep cuts where the wire dug into her flesh, and her arms were bright red. It looked like such a thin line.  
There’d be one of those in that man’s neck now. She didn’t even know his name.  
Oh god. She’d killed someone.  
Horror rose up as twenty-five years of western morals shoved past a few months of brainwashing.  
She’d actually killed someone.  
Melanie Alert fell on her hands and knees, and threw up.  
....  
A month later, she walked straight backed out of the arena, leaving two men unconscious on the Pit floor.  
She hadn’t lost count of how many she’d had to kill yet, but things had gotten easier.  
That thought still made bile rise up her thought.  
It wasn’t meant to get easier, every face was meant to haunt your dreams and make you wake up in a cold sweat at night. And while her fifteen did haunt her, and did give her nightmares, it was somehow easier to deal with than when it was only one. Each time she had to kill, it was easier and easier to force her hands to move, to extinguish another life.  
It also got easier and easier not to kill them, simply because they were less likely to kill her. She’d gotten better at playing in the Pit, and each hard won step let her leave more people alive. She hadn’t used wire since that first match, hadn’t dared to since wire could only cut. That didn’t stop people from calling her that though.  
‘Wire’ was the fighter that was announced at the beginning of a match. It made her glad and let her separate herself from her job. ‘Wire’ killed people, not Melanie Alert. Never Melanie Alert.  
Today was what her cell guard called ‘Titan day’. Strange as it might sound, he was a friend of Wire’s. They played cards for food and information. She didn’t know his name, and he didn’t know hers, and both were careful never to spill personal information.  
She’d asked him once, about an Underground Gang that had been pretty powerful up until ’44, when the leader up and vanished.  
He’d just warned her off – told her there were some things it was better not to ask questions about.  
She’d acquiesced, if reluctantly.  
‘Titan Day’ was exactly what it sounded like: the nobles would bring in a captured Titan, and then send us Pit inhabitants at it until we’d either all died or the Titan was dead. Rumour has it that the killer was free to go.  
Lots of things were supposed to free you, and most of them just got you killed. She didn’t think this would be any different.  
Hers had been the last morning match: this afternoon they’d bring in the Titan and the Military. There were enough corrupt cops around that the nobles could afford to bring in security in case the Titan wasn’t felled.  
Lunch was for once something actually filling: Meat and noodles and sauce and even cake! But she gambled away the noodles and sauce for a glass of milk and another of juice; and hid the meat in the back corner of her cell. She remembered how easy it was to get cramps from eating before strenuous exercise and she refused to die because of a cramp.  
The cake, she ate. You just don’t say no to cake.  
For the first time in her month of the Pit, she picked up the wire again. This time, though, she also picked up gloves, and a piece of sharpened Military Blade. Just because she didn’t think she would be freed if she killed the Titan didn’t mean she wasn’t willing to try.  
Then it was time and she was being herded towards the Pit. The titan was small, if she had to guess, she’d say about five meters tall. That didn’t stop it from being terrifying. For a moment, she stopped, transfixed by the fact that a human had been turned into this.  
Then she shook her head and reminded herself that killing Titans wasn’t murder, but Euthanasia.  
She pulled off her shoe and tied it to the end of the wire. She didn’t know how many people had gone before her but judging from the stench in the air there had been a few. The Titan bumbled towards her, huge hands outstretched, and for a second she wished she had a bow. Then she shoved her dirty shoe into her mouth and started climbing the wall of the Pit as fast as she could. It was rough rock, so it was pretty easygoing.  
When she thought she was above the Titan’s head, she looked back to see a hand headed for her, head maybe a meter away from her. She cursed around the Shoe, threw said shoe over the Titan’s shoulder and then jumped.  
She landed in a roll. Five meters was pushing it, but she’d had to jump from higher for the circus before. Then she ran straight between the things legs, grabbed her other shoe and tied that to the other end of the wire. Then she started climbing the other side of the Pit. Again she threw the shoe over the Titan’s shoulder and again she dropped and rolled. Then she grabbed one shoe, waited until the titan stooped to pick her up, pulled and ran around the foot of the Titan. Then she grabbed the other shoe and did the same to the other foot.  
Then she tried to run behind the thing. Instead, a huge hand grabbed her by her middle and lifted her off the ground.  
Then the thing tried to stand. First the wires around the feet tightened until they began to smoke. Then the wire around the back of the Titan’s neck began to cut into its nape. The hand holding Melanie continued moving towards the Titan’s mouth, even as that self same Titan started pitching forwards onto its head. Then, for just a second, the entire Titan went slack, and Melanie fell to the floor.  
She was really glad her gamble had paid out.  
She scrambled out of the way as the Titan landed heavily on its head. Her hands scrambled for the sharp bit of metal on her back and she ran straight into the steam cloud coming from its neck.  
She jumped onto its nape and jammed the bit of metal straight into where she prayed the spine of the origin Human was.  
She let out a sigh of relief when she saw the raised arm drop back down to the floor. Steam choked her but she didn’t let go, forcing the piece of metal to stay in place even as the Titan tried to regenerate.  
Minutes – Hours – she didn’t even know later, the steam grew in strength and she could just about make up the arm steaming. Still she didn’t move, until the nape under her dissolved and she landed with a hard crash on the unforgiving Pit floor.  
Silence.  
Slowly she got up and walked to where her shoes hung. She untied them and slid them on her feet, and then slowly started winding the wire back up.  
Then the cheering started and Melanie couldn’t help but slump. The silence had been preferable over this wild chant of ‘Wire’.


	4. Chapter 4

Her Cell guard came to pick her up, and instead of leading her back to the Jail, he led her down a musky tunnel and back up the steps she'd walked down that long, long month ago.  
For a moment, a chuckle escaped her.  
A brainwashed teen had gone down those steps and a Killer was walking back up them.  
She was led back to that same room she used to perform in: to her surprise, the circus she had come here with was still present.  
Susie walked up to her and gave her a hug. She tentatively hugged back. She waved to the other performers over Susie’s back and tilted her head towards the Circus Master.  
Then she untangled herself and turned towards the nobles coming up the stairs behind her.  
“Lady Margaret,” she spoke, low and carrying,  
“To what do I owe the pleasure?”  
She ignored the looks the Circus Master was giving her: he’d lost his hold on her the day she’d been forced to kill. Instead she kept her head high and her eyes level with that of the woman in front of her.  
The smile on her face was almost sour.  
“As is traditional for a loaned fighter, upon winning the Titan Day, the owner of said fighter earns himself the previously bet prize.”  
Here she handed a sack of money over to the Circus Master. It rankled a little to hear the man referred to as her owner, and that gave her a sense of relief.  
“The fighter themselves gets a small prize as well as the weapons used to defeat the Titan.”  
She took the small pouch held out to her without a word, as well as the medal and knife. The knife was nothing like what she had used to kill that Titan, but she didn’t say a thing. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Marco staring at the knife with wide eyes. Apparently there was more to it than what she could see.  
With that, the woman turned and left her alone with the circus.  
She didn’t move for a second, and then stuck the knife and the badge into her boot. The wire she held in her hand.  
The Circus Master looked at her stonily and then motioned for them to follow. She did, though rather reluctantly.  
When they reached camp, Melanie changed out of her leotards and back into her travelling clothes. Her winnings she dumped into her travelling bag, which by now contained nothing but her bag of herbs, her last blanket, the knife and the box her mother left her with. She dumped the other little things she’d collected over her stay with the circus into the same bag and then slunk out.  
She could hear the others celebrating not too far away and carefully moved in the other direction towards the cages. Carefully, she picked up the masters bullwhip and stuck it into her belt.  
Saying goodbye to the animals was quickly done and then she was headed back towards where the others were laughing. From the shadows she could see them drinking and laughing over having Melanie back. They were good people. She couldn’t be objective over the master, but she’d genuinely liked the rest of the circus. She probably wouldn’t even have minded running with them for a while if they had asked.  
She stepped out into the light of the fire, and slowly more and more heads turned towards her. When she was sure she had everyone’s attention, she slipped the hood of her cloak off her head and said,  
“I’m leaving.”  
In an instant Susie was all over her again.  
“But you just returned!” That was Marco. Leopold hit him over the head.  
“You know she never joined willingly in the first place.”  
Susie stepped back and looked at the ground, everyone else refused to look her in the eyes.  
She let a small smile out from under the mask she’d had to don.  
“I’ll miss you guys. The Circus Master decided to kidnap me, not you. You were fun company. But I was headed somewhere before all this, and they’re waiting for me there. I’m already really late.”  
Then she turned around and walked away. No one called her back.

It took her a few days of walking to reach the gate to the Inner City. Melanie spent most of them staring at the sky and smelling what flowers she saw on the side of the path. Being above ground was something she’d never appreciated enough, the month in the Pit had shown her that.   
She also spent a lot of the time decompressing, and just enjoying being free again. It meant a lot of nightmares, and a lot of talking to thin air about bad experiences, but it gave her a lightness she hadn’t felt since before ’45.  
The Inner City was located inside the walls of the main castle in the centre of all the Walls. There were two gates into the castle, and one was locked at all times. The other had a heavy guard of MP soldiers in a double ring around it. Getting in would be nigh on impossible.  
Melanie frowned at that thought. Two years ago, she’d left a letter with Armin telling him she was following up on two rumours she had heard. They were more hunches than rumours, and part of her was terrified that it took almost an entire year to get to this point.  
She left the roadside she had been relaxing on and headed to the fore-town’s gambling parlour to waste some time. Just as she was about to duck into an alleyway, one of the nobles carriages that were so frequent here rode up to the gate. Melanie pulled her hood down and let the sun catch in her frizzy, dirty hair.  
The MPs swarmed the wagon, checking it from all sides for unwanted passengers, then one rapped his knuckles against the side of the carriage and the man inside handed him a bundle of paper. One MP unrolled the bundle and checked the papers against the light. Then he handed them back and nodded to the others. They stepped back and let the carriage through.  
Melanie frowned. After checking the carriage, it might be possible to sneak past the MPs. They’d be focussed on the carriage, and wouldn’t see what was happening behind them. The carriage would block the view of those on the other side. It would only work if the carriage’s curtains were drawn, and it was dark enough to mask her shadow from the guards on top of the wall.  
She pulled her hood up again and slipped into the sleazier side of town.  
It was dark and raining the next time Melanie took up vigilance. She sat on a rooftop in the shadow of a chimney and clear sight of the gate. So far, two travellers had passed through as well as a herder with a horde of sheep. Too bad it hadn’t been cows; she might have been able to slip in between them.  
The quiet sound of jumping pebbles alerted her to the fact that a carriage was coming through. The carriage was heading out this time, and the MPs took one look at the paperwork and then let it through. The MPs increased with darkness, and she wasn’t sure her idea was viable. She’d have to come back and check.  
The third time Melanie hunkered down near the gate the sky was covered in storm clouds. Unlike the last few times, this time she had her pack with her. If she was right, the storm clouds would cause dark to fall earlier: if she was lucky, early enough that it would be dark before the guard changed to the increased MP count of the night guard.  
She watched as a caravan approached, was checked, and then waved through. She’d be able to sneak past if the guard number remained the same.  
She didn’t know how long she sat there, dark slowly falling and the thunder getting louder and more frequent until she finally decided it was dark enough: any darker, and they would probably light the lanterns.  
As luck would have it, at that moment a carriage rode down the road towards the gate. It had its windows drawn and the Garrison Corps Roses on the back. Melanie grinned. The Roses and the Unicorns were constantly in a silent war over who guarded the inner gates. There was no way the MPs wouldn’t check them as thoroughly as possible, if only to inconvenience them. She jumped down from her rooftop, and stood in the shadows waiting for the carriage. When it drew level with her, she calmly started walking. She ducked into an alley for a second, and watched as the entire MP cohort turned to gaze at the carriage as if it were made of sugarcane.  
Melanie waited until most of the MPs were busy and then started slinking past the carriage. She was almost past them when she heard an MP ordering a search of the interior of the carriage. She turned around just in time to see the door to the carriage open and a booted foot step down onto the road.  
Damn, he’d see her.  
She pulled her hood off her head, turned around and ran straight past the man as fast as she could, back the direction she came from. She wasn’t surprised when a booted foot tripped her up and she landed on her face. Before she could get back on her feet, someone forced her arm into a half nelson and shoved her back into the ground.  
Now to pray they came to the right conclusion.  
“You ain’t gonna get me back in there. Freedom! I ain’t going back, ya hear me?”  
She struggled all she could, and swore out the Military Police Officer who was holding her down.  
“Another escaped gutter rat.”  
She hid her grin behind mutters questioning the man’s parentage ad sexuality. Not that anyone could see it anyway, since her face was having a rather painful make-out session with the ground.  
She was hauled up to her feet and marched straight through the gate she had such trouble with. Behind it was a city of white marble and carved dark wood. Melanie forced herself to continue moving, even as she really just wanted to stop and stare. She’d never – in both lifetimes – seen anything as understatedly rich before. The man led her to the top of a staircase in one of the buildings; and then down and down and down and down. She tried to escape a few times for appearance sake, even as her heart sank as they passed checkpoint after checkpoint. She’d have a real time getting back out of here.  
She swallowed her trepidation and instead straightened her spine. One step at a time, Melanie.


	5. Chapter 5

At first glance the Underground doesn’t look much different from one of the smaller villages out in Maria, but all it takes is one trip to the Gambling hall to thoroughly smash that image. It’s in the way the gamblers stand, in the way that steel is openly and not so openly carried, in the way that the entire establishment leers when she comes in at the door.  
It doesn’t take her many games to realize that some of these people know what they’re doing. She plays more carefully than usual, winning some and losing only a little. She leaves before the stakes get higher than she can afford. Then she hunkers down in a nearby alley and breathes. She learnt Poker from a master, a life time ago. She has several sets of tells and an almost photographic memory on her side, and still she fell for someone else’s tricks. Still she got played.  
She isn’t perfect: she knows that, but it’s the first time it’s happened in SnK, and that makes it worrying. She pulls the loaf of bread she won out of her bag and nibbles on the end. It’s almost laughable that she’s back to this; back to gambling for food like she hasn’t had to in almost twenty five years.  
When night fell, and the amount of stragglers in the streets didn’t go down significantly, he worries compounded themselves. She’d always known that Levi used to live in the pits, she’d just never really thought about it. She bit on her lip. She’d have to assume this place was as bad as Paris used to be.  
She made certain that her hood covered her hair and then slunk into alleyway. She’d need to map the place out as soon as possible.  
It took her two days and nights of non-stop walking to get a manageable map of the Underground into her head. In that time, she’d fallen afoul of the local Yakuza. She’d apparently won a game against the Boss’s child-toy and as such invited his ire. Melanie just looked on, not even surprised anymore. The description they had: young lad with dark brown hair, wore a cloak, was easy enough to work around. She washed her hair for the first since the circus, and kept the cloak in her bag. It was enough to let her walk past that same boy and not get recognized.  
Nevertheless, it took about a week for her to gain a bit of a reputation in the gambling dens she frequented. It was enough for the bouncer to let her in without being frisked or having to pay him off most nights, and for that she was thankful. She played for information and for food, staking food and the money she’d won in the Pit. She always played small, asking for bits and pieces here and there; mostly general advice and information. Some part of her realized she was acting like a budding spy master: but as no one had called her out on it yet, she assumed the position of information broker hadn’t been taken yet or no one had cause to worry as the current one had staked an interest. She didn’t really know, nor did she really care. She didn’t plan on staying here long, as she wanted to be out on Maria by the time Trost fell in three years.  
By now she’d narrowed down Levi’s old sphere of influence to a five block square to the western side of the Underground. Finding his old hideout would take days of comparing the houses to what she remembered, but it was doable.  
Three weeks later, she gave up. She’d found the hideout, even gotten in past the noses of the gang currently using it. She’d searched the entire thing five times and was still no closer to finding any leftover 3DMG. Then she’d started searching the other houses nearby, to see if they hadn’t left them somewhere else. Now, she was out of places to search.  
“Face it, Melanie, Levi cleaned up.”  
She felt like crying. She let a hand fall into a fist and punched the wall. Damn, she felt sick. Levi had cleaned up. Then she forced herself back onto her feet. Alright, Levi had cleaned up. All that meant was she needed a change of plans. What else could she do in the underground?  
She could steal from the MPs, and then run. She could just leave. She ... couldn’t think of anything else.  
She needed manoeuvre gear. That was priority number one. That and gas.  
Wait a second. Melanie felt like slapping herself. Where did Levi get gas from? A corrupt MP? A personal stash? It was a lead she hadn’t explored yet, and that made it worth the world.  
Melanie returned to the Gambling dens.  
The first time she saw someone get murdered outside the Pit, it was in a gambling den. It was one of the rare days that someone from Above deigned to come down for a bit of fun. The entire place was crawling with bodyguards and MPs for protection. Quite a few of the more desperate ones and two of the card sharks after money had joined the rich boy at the table. She personally had steered clear of the table, sitting on the opposite side of the room. She’d been professionally frisked upon entrance, but the bruiser had handed her knife back after finding it. Everyone was on edge because of the high stakes game being played on the table next to the door. High stakes usually meant brawl, and often accidental death: and in the pits, wounds got infected more often than not. With so few doctors around, infections either went away by themselves or killed you. She’d been playing quietly with one of her regulars and a few newbs, quietly exchanging food and money for information, when one of the players laid down a contract that everyone down here knew. She nodded at the man opposite her and laid down her cards. Both of them were getting out of here. She could see the more experienced players on the other tables deciding the same thing, and nudged the teenager with the bangle next to her, whispering to him to get his gang out. Then the cards were put onto the table, and she winced at the smug grin on the Abovie’s face. One of the men had gambled with his right to be considered a free human being, and lost. An anguished cry confirmed her suspicion and she was halfway to her feet even as the man lunged across the table with a knife in his hand. The Abovie’s face paled in pain before anyone could react, and the familiar smell of Iron rose to her nose. Then one of the MPs pulled a gun and shot.  
The man crashed to the floor. Melanie turned her eyes to the Abovie and saw that he’d been hit in the lungs. That meant he would die. She grimaced, and followed the others out the door. Then she walked into one of the emptier alleyways and threw up.  
She felt like throwing up again. That entire thing: from the contract to the gun shot was so wrong, Melanie couldn’t help the tears that came to her eyes. It was easy, so scarily easy to forget humanity as Wire, and for a moment she’d seen a thin red smile on that Abovie’s neck.


	6. Chapter 6

Melanie spent most of her days walking through the Underground and talking to people, be they merchants or homeless people. She’d keep an eye out for anything suspicious of course, but sneaking around was what she did at night. She didn’t know how there was a day down here, but that was something else. At night, she gambled and snuck about and sometimes, when she was about to crash, slept. The day she spent hunting for any little titbit of information the locals were willing to part with. It wasn’t healthy, especially together with her very vitamin lacking diet, but it was all she could do.  
Then, one day, she found a hole in the ceiling of the cave the Underground was in. And in the middle of the clearing of green where the sun shone, a single sword stuck out of the ground. Melanie slowly walked over to it, and traced the sharp edge with a gloved finger. She stopped short when she realized that beside it two broken blades were stabbed into the grass, formerly hidden by the undergrowth.  
“Levi really did clean up.” She whispered. She started coming there as often as she could, always at dawn. She never stayed long, but she told the grave all she could remember about Levi. Him and the spec ops squad he led.

Three months later, she finally had a lead. It was a part of the old Military Barracks of the Underground. According to rumours, there had once been a cellar to the building before it collapsed and the military build a new one. Melanie was sure the cellar still existed.  
The barracks building was in an unguarded part of the Underground, rear the stairway back up Above. The place was a ruin: three of its four walls had caved in, and the roof support beams stuck out of what was left of the roof like stakes.  
Melanie snuck in at Twilight, as she always did. She searched everything as methodologically as she could, without further damaging the building and finally found a trapdoor in the side of the collapsed well behind the main building. She rolled up her cloak and pulled her two throwing knives out of her pack. Then she hid that and the cloak in the ruins.  
The trapdoor itself was rusty, but the hinges were oiled and it opened easily to her touch. She carefully shimmied down the well, feet bracing against the sides, until her head was level with the trap door. Then she swung it open, up and out until it hid her view of the cavern roof.  
The trapdoor hid a tube just big enough to crawl through. Melanie heaved herself into the duct and let the trapdoor fall closer behind her. It was completely dark, but she slithered forwards anyways. She heard what sounded like scurrying rats, and then her hands hit a sharp turn in the tunnel. It took a bit of manoeuvring but she managed to move past the bend. Then her hand fell into nothingness and she gulped.  
She still couldn’t see anything, so she let her hands roam, trying to discover what this hole was.  
It quickly became apparent that the hole was the end of the duct; or more accurately, that the duct continued straight down. Melanie had no choice. She’d have to shimmy down this part of the duct head first. She didn’t know how long she hung head first in that duct, but it must have been a while. Then her hand hit open air again.  
She felt around with the one hand she had free and felt panic build up as she couldn’t find a continuation of the duct. Apparently it opened up into midair.  
She pulled a knife out of her belt and let it fall. The clattering told her that there was a room below her, and not a wider shaft.  
She curled up in a ball and let herself fall. The landing shoved the air out of her lungs, and she blacked out.   
Some undefined time later; she woke up in a room illuminated by light spilling in from a huge hole in the wall. Her back hurt, and she slowly forced herself back onto her feet.  
The room was dominated on one side by a huge glass tank, while the others were covered by shelves and shelves of weaponry. In the middle of the room stood a table, upon which three sets of manoeuvre gear lay.  
Melanie let her eyes roam the shelves and the uniforms, cables, MG tanks and other bits and pieces that covered them. Then she picked up a screwdriver, walked up to the manoeuvre Gear lying on the table and began pulling it apart.

The night after finding the grave of Isabel and Farlan, Melanie cried herself to sleep. Maybe it was mourning the two bright children, or maybe it was mourning in general. She didn’t know. She spent most of that night in distorted dreams full of vengeful Ghosts and hands coated in red. She found corpses over corpses of people that didn’t even exist here, and people she hadn’t killed. Sometimes she would find a sweet voice whispering ‘your entire fault’ while she stood on the wall, looking over Shinganshina, or Paris, or Bucharest.  
And every now and then she’d suddenly be sitting there with Moritz in her lap, telling him about Rome and Greece, or dancing with Frank and when she looked at them the flesh on their faces would fall off, until skulls grin at her and her hands surround a ribcage.  
When she woke up the next day, she vowed never to kill again. And then she cried, and collapsed to her knees, because she knew she’d never be able to keep that promise.

It took her a week to cobble together a working 3DMG from the bits and pieces on the shelves in that room. It took ten months to learn to use it. At first, it was a simple matter of learning to aim. Then she had to learn how to swing in the cables without disconnecting the anchors. The controls had two buttons: one to shoot out the anchored cables and one to reel the cable back in. The anchors worked by jerking hips, which meant swinging had to be done without fast increases in tension, and anchors could only be loosened when there was a little give in the cable. Her acrobatics played well with the gear, and most of the months were spent either practicing her control over the anchors or relearning her circus tricks with the extra weight of manoeuvre gear on her hips.  
When she finally decided to leave, she left a new name behind. They called her ‘Mouse’, like they’d once called her ‘Wire’. But it’s Melanie that stands at the base of the Stairway, pouch of money in hand and 3DMG hidden under her dirty cloak. She paid her way up the stairs, past those checkpoints she remembered being dragged down a year ago. Part of her wonders why the truly life altering events in her life always happen when she walks down stairs. Then the sun hits her eyes for the first time in over a year, and she can’t bring herself to care.  
She pays her way back out of the inner city. By now it’s easy to fake the paperwork necessary, to fake the king’s seal. She’s seen enough slave contracts for that.  
They let her walk out of the austere beauty of the inner city and into the sunshine. For a moment, she stood at the edge of the gate town, just admiring the vast expanse of green, and then she swung herself on her appropriated horse and rode hard for Wall Sina. It’s exhilarating to be on the move again, this time back out. It’s just her, the wind and a stolen horse and for the first time in a very long time, she cracked a happy smile.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter for a while.

It took two days of hard riding to reach Wall Sina. It’s a part away from any towns, which she hoped wouldn’t be as patrolled. She cut her horse free, and hunkered down against the Titan-crystal for a nap. She’d start climbing after the sun set.  
The climb up to the top of Sina took almost three full hours. By the end of it, her arms were aching from hanging onto the hilts of her two throwing knives. There was no one on top of the wall so she just walked to the other side and slammed the anchor of her right 3DMG cable into the rock. Then she swung over the side and slid down the rope slowly until her feet hit the ground. One harsh pull on the cable and the anchor came slithering down the side of the wall. Melanie didn’t waste gas to rewind to cable, instead manually rolling it up and hanging to coil from her belt.  
Then she turned around and walked away from the wall.  
Two days of walking later, she hit a small village. Again she appropriated a horse and some food, and then rode for the hills. If she remembered correctly, the transit Rose – Sina took five days without break last time. Melanie looked at the sky as the horse trotted under her and let out a heavy sigh. She’d take it easy this time, since the ride from Rose to Maria would be harrowing enough without doing it after having not slept or eaten for a week. In front of her, she could already see the first houses of the next village.  
Reluctantly, she jumped off the horse and set it off back the way she came from. If it was well trained, it would find its way home on its lonesome.  
The village was a small one, with an inn and a pub. She bartered for a place to curl up in, and ended up bartending in return for the use of the floor. It wasn’t the fairest of exchanges, but Melanie couldn’t really bring herself to mind. After her shift, she sat down with a few drunks and the inn owner and player a few friendly games. When the others devolved into playing with stakes; she played for food and information. Then one of the gamblers offered her a horse in return for information. Melanie looked at the man, in his twenties, and nodded. If she lost that round it was down to her curiosity.  
“So, what’s your name?”  
Melanie looked at the man, and asked. “Are you sure you want to ask that?”  
When the drunk just grinned, she sighed.  
“I don’t know anymore. It used to be Melanie, then it was Wire, some days it’s Mouse, and some days it’s something else.”  
Then the next cards were dealt and no more was said on the topic.  
The next day she moved on.

Three weeks of slow travelling later, filled with lots of visits to villages and even a few small cities, and again Wall Rose rose into view. Melanie smiled at the old friend, excitement and a cold feeling curling in her gut at the sight.  
It took half a day’s travel to get close enough to touch. Again Melanie pulled two of her throwing knives out of her pack, and slammed them into the wall. She pulled herself up, pulled the right one out, slammed it in as high as she could reach pulled herself up, pulled out the left one, slammed it in as high as she could reach, pulled herself up, pulled the right one out and slammed it back in as high as she could reach pulled herself up. Rise and repeat. Don’t look down, just focus on the knives. In a way the repetition was sort of calming, and soon she found herself mechanically moving, half dozing.  
A long while later, her aching arm slammed a knife into the top of the wall. She pulled herself up, and then stood on wobbly legs. She grimaced and decided to take a break up on the wall before sliding down the other side. The moment her feet hit the floor, she’d have to be moving, and she wanted to be as rested as possible before her sprint to Wall Maria.  
The year was ’49, only a few months left until Armin graduated from the Military Camp and Trost fell. Melanie sighed and hunkered down behind a cannon, curled up in her final – and by now very threadbare – blanket.   
Falling asleep in a place where the sun rose: a place where she was not meant to be was a very bad idea. She’d done it before and it had cost her an entire year on this quest. Any yet she would need rest before she could brave the Titan infested lands of Maria.  
So she kept eyes and ears open, even as she let her body relax. Part of her was suddenly unsure, faced with the fact that she was leaving, and leaving everything behind. Melanie sighed and pulled a hand through her blond hair. She’d gone through a lot to get here, wasn’t it ridiculous that she was getting cold feet now of all times? Her hands slid into her pack, searching for a distraction. She pulled out the badge that lady in Sina gave her, as well as the knife and what little of the money that was left. She never asked Marco wheat was special about that knife.  
Next her hands pulled out the pack of playing cards Susie left her with, and the bullwhip she stole. She still hadn’t found a use for the thing, although the playing cards had proven invaluable as a source of food. Marco’s knives she gently put down on the floor, beside the kitchen knife she’s taken all those years ago. Then she pulled out all the clothes that had found themselves a home in her bag, from the black leotards of the Pit to the many colourful outfits she wore as an acrobat and the green Quipao-like dress she’d wear in the animal shows.  
There wasn’t much left in the bottom of her bag, just a bag of food for the last race, that packet of herbs she’d never thrown away and the box her mother had pressed into her hands. She’d all but forgotten about it.  
For a moment she just held the thing, before gently prying loose the lid. Then she let the contents fall into her lap. It took a moment to process what she was seeing, and then she quickly unravelled what she could swear was an old, faded flag of China. Wrapped inside the faded red material were heavily ornamental scroll and a folded piece of paper.  
She lifted the reddish cloth up to the light of early morning and sure enough the yellow moon and star lifted themselves off in a lighter gray. Why China, she wondered. She folded the cloth again and turned to the two piece of parchment still in her lap. She picked up the paper and unfolded it, finding an old map of the earth. It lacked America, and Africa and Asia were drawn in almost as afterthoughts when compared to the large Europe; however the really interesting part of it was the three concentric wobbly circles between three dots marked Antwerpen, Kiel and Prag.   
Melanie just stared. She wasn’t seeing things here, was she? Shakily, she carefully folded the paper again and placed it reverently on the flag. Then she picked up the scroll and slowly unravelled that too. It seemed quite a bit older than the paper, and she was afraid the parchment would break.  
Embossed in gold next to a lot of Greek text was a wreath of some kind of leaves; probably laurel or olive. Melanie let her eyes trace the letters, eyes catching on Ζεύς, which she was pretty sure meant Zeus, νίκη, which if she remembered her Greek alphabet right sounded like ‘niki’, as in the goddess of victory, and most tellingly Ολυμπία which she’d bet meant Olympia.  
She was holding a document declaring the winner for one of the disciplines at an Olympic game.  
Melanie packed everything back up, and put it back into the box. Then she wrapped that in as many layers of clothing as she could, before stuffing it back into her pack. For a long moment she just sat there, staring out at the sky with her pack in her lap. Well. That was something.


	8. Chapter 8

By now the sun had risen fully, but Melanie stayed where she was. She still had to wait for nightfall before she could move again, and until then she’d have to doze up here.   
Unlike wall Sina, Maria was patrolled by Roses, and with the sun, she could see the first ghostly shadows moving along the wall. She wasn’t that far from Trost, and so patrols were heavier than elsewhere. Melanie hunkered down behind a set of cannons, and fought her eyes. She was so close to her goal now, she refused to fail.  
Men and women walked past her, serious and dead in a way she had never seen before. Some drank, one even smoked, but all had the mien of soldiers in a war, fighting in a way no one she had met in Snk seemed to. The Roses stood like last sentries, with eves as weary as those of old hawks. It almost made Melanie feel ashamed. She was running after all, not fighting.  
She’d never fought before.  
She seriously considered leaving the map for the scouting legion to find, once, but the burning wish for safety kept her away. Trost would fall, and Rose would follow. She had been given fourteen years of peace and happiness. Fourteen years to marvel at the stars and sky, and then she’d been given a miracle. She’d survived.  
She refused to die now. Not so close to freedom.  
When the sun finally disappeared behind the horizon, Melanie pulled herself out of her hiding place and spared a glance down the wall. She wasn’t surprised to find Titans clawing at it, although she had been hoping for a free landing area.  
Melanie didn’t dare drop down off the wall while titans were in the way, so against her wishes to remain inconspicuous, she loaded the nearby cannon, and began aiming. There were only three titans she needed to worry about, and she would need to dispose of them quickly, before Roses came to investigate the commotion.  
She had never fired a firearm before, and her first shot went wild. She could hear cursing on the wind, and had to prevent herself from cussing in return. She reloaded hurriedly, and sighed in relief when the cannonball hit one of the titans straight through the neck. By the time only the last titan stood, the Garrison soldiers were seconds away, and Melanie decided it would have to do.  
The last cannonball missed the titan by meters, and she jumped over the edge of the wall and into free fall. For a long moment, she was frozen by panic, and then she smashed the Anchor of her 3DMG cable into the stonework. Her hands gripped the iron cable, and she prayed in thanks for her gloves, as even while wearing them, the heat was almost unbearable.   
She slid to a stop about halfway down, still above the reach of the ten meter class. Above her, the sound of pressurized gas told her that the soldiers were following her, and she decided that getting away was more important than saving gas.  
For the first time since leaving underground, her hand gripped the blades at her hip, and pressed the recall button on her right cable. She kicked off the wall while rocketing upwards, and freed the anchor with a rough jerk of her hips. In free fall again, she dropped fast straight above the titan’s gaping maw. Heart in her throat, she forced herself to wait, and when she finally fell to tree height, angled her hips downwards towards one of the thicker branches of the trees. Eject, wait until it hit, and then recall and swing in a large arc. She rocketed towards the ground and curled into a tight ball, barely missing the compact earth with her trajectory.  
She landed on a branch in the tree ahead, easily above the heads of most titans, and manually pulled in her cable. The sound of cannon fire assured her that at least the titan wouldn’t be following her, even if the swish of cables suggested the Garrison would.  
She gave herself a minute to breathe, before forcing herself up the trunk, using the same tried and true method she’d used for the walls. She forced herself as high as she could go, before slumping against a branch. Below her, the Garrison swung past, and she took the lucky break to relax and examine her gas tanks. Luckily, her manoeuvre hadn’t cost her much, and the high pressure liquid was still mostly there. She’d lost maybe a millimetre in length, but not enough to stop the tank from seeming full.  
The sudden escape from the titan left her strangely exhausted as the adrenaline left her body, but she couldn’t stay here. Titans clawing at her tree would give her away in no time.  
She forced herself to her feet, and jumped downwards from branch to branch until the distance was too much. Then she pulled out her trusty knives, and stabbed her way down the rest. The moment her feet hit the ground, she took off running towards the nearest ruin of a village. Supplies would be useful, and the faster she collected, the better.  
She’d been running all of fifteen minutes when heavy footfalls alerted her to titans running behind her. Her legs were already burning, but she forced herself forward, forced herself faster. She hoped the village would have a horse, as she had a sinking feeling her crazy race would be over otherwise.  
The village came into view just as she broke through the trees, and she could feel herself tiring badly. Still she ran forwards, through the gates and past broken houses, whistling and hoping beyond hope that some animal was going to answer her call. Rhythmic thudding caught her attention, almost drowned out by the sound of the Titan’s footfalls. Sure enough, a pair of horses ran towards her, one bare and the other with a saddle attached sideways to its body. Both were thin, but at this point she didn’t care. She swung herself bare back, and kicked the beast into gallop. She was going to do this.  
A little fact she remembered from the show: excluding Abnormals, Titans and horses had about the same speed. Another fact was that titans slowed down and slept during the night. The sun was long past the horizon, but the sky was still light and the titans behind her were slowing down. She could do this, as long as no abnormal turned up, she’d survive.  
As if called by the thought, a titan landed but a few meters away from her. It was an abnormal: a jumper. Melanie didn’t leave herself time to think, she shot out a cable and vaulted of her horse and towards its legs, one sword out of its holster. She hoped human and Titan anatomy was similar enough, and swung as she sped by its other leg. Her sword bit into the inside of its knee, and she vaulted up and around, cursing as the titan didn’t stumble and fall as a human would have. Her other cable smashed into its nape, and she reeled herself in, swords out and ready.  
Euthanasia, she reminded herself, and cut a big wedge out of its neck. Then she dropped back onto the ground and resumed running. The Titans had gotten a lot closer in the minute it had taken to kill the abnormal, but thankfully the horse had continued running and was at her side at the sound of her whistle. She jumped back up, and continued running.  
When the sun finally set, and heavy thumps behind her signalled the collapse of her chasers, she turned her horse around and headed around to finish the titans while they were vulnerable. As she had hoped, only a few gave a token of a fight, the most mobile of them managing no more than to push itself up on its hands and knees.   
She felt a lot safer with the knowledge of their demise, and as such dropped her mad rush to a more manageable trot. She also took the time to cut loose the saddle tied to her spare, wincing at the sight of the wounds constant rubbing had caused. At least they would be able to heal now.  
She led her horses to the next town, fed them and found some food for herself, before continuing on. She rode through most of the night, stopping when the sky began lightening again. She tied her horses to a tree, and then walked another minute before climbing one herself. At twenty five meters off the ground, she let herself relax, and slowly dozed off, waking only sometimes at the sound of snapping branches. Once, a hand came uncomfortably close to where he was lounging, so she scampered up even higher and waited for night to fall.


	9. Chapter 9

Strangely enough, it took until midday for the first abnormal to appear. It was a runner, one of those that stuck its arms to its sides and shook its head around. Melanie had seen one, that was asleep, but now she would have to fight it.  
Thankfully, it was dumb. So once she’d lodged herself fast onto its wobbling head, all it took was a clean strike and both she and titan toppled over. She jumped off, and resumed running, catching up with her horse and racing onwards towards Wall Maria.  
The next hour involved fighting titan after titan after titan, only ever abnormal that her horse couldn’t outrun, and the few titans that headed towards her instead of following once she zoomed past them.  
She evaded trees as much as possible, preferring to be able to see the monsters coming over the cover and manoeuvrability they would provide.  
Still the day wore on, and the crowd following her grew in size. She was tired, a mix of lack of sleep and adrenaline crashes forcing her eyes closed despite everything. She rode on, and when her horse slowed down, swapped despite the open wounds decorating her second’s flanks. She couldn’t afford to slow down, she had to survive. Still more abnormal arrived, and her first blade snapped as a tired arm jerked it wrong. She shoved the broken pieces into a holster and swapped blade.  
Finally the sky began tingeing red and still she rode on, even after the first titans began dropping. She pushed through the entire night, and finally collapsed on a tree trunk a few hours before the break of down. Three more days, she reminded herself. This would take three to five more days. She could do this.  
When night swung around again, she swung herself onto her healthy horse, stopping only for supplies. Four more nights she rode, until finally she saw the wall in the distance. Reluctantly, she stopped for the night, swearing when a look at her tanks confirmed her fears: they were almost empty. She would need to go on an extensive supply run, and then climb the wall. Still, she couldn’t stop the warm glow in her chest. She had managed it. Before her lay Wall Maria.  
That day, she couldn’t sleep. Worries and doubts plagued her mind. She was running, she knew she was, and jet she couldn’t help but agree with her decision every time she thought about it. The humans within the walls were done for, for the most part. Both Maria and Rose would fall, the king would die, and she didn’t know if the few humans left in Sina would survive. She didn’t know if the Beast would be killed, or if Titans would be cured. All she wanted was to live, and to do that she’d bet on the small district cities the Shifters had hopefully ignored. Again and again, her thoughts turned to the piece of paper in her bag, and each time she resolutely ignored it. She could pass it on once she was safe.  
If she would ever be safe.

Wall Maria was no larger than Wall Rose. Melanie sighed from her perch up on the stone and crystallized Titan, and watched as both sides were assaulted by the monsters. She’d gathered enough supplies for a week of travel; all she had to do now was set off running.  
She was so close, and jet she found herself hesitating again. Sat on the wall, surrounded by nothing but titans and nature, she found herself tiring. Melanie bit her teeth and stood up, turning in the opposite direction of Shinganshina.  
Then she started running.

 

The days and nights blended together, and still Melanie ran. She didn’t think, just ran on and on until finally the wall broke into parts before her.  
Her eyes swept across the small city of Ilea, the west city in wall Maria, eyes roving for some sign of movement. She looked for minutes, looking for signs of humanity. She walked the length of the wall, finding nothing but intact walls. That meant little, as the Beast could still have been through.  
Finally, she dropped down to the streets.  
She spent a week in Ilea, a week to bury those dead that had remained. She’d searched for humans, and found corpses. She’d looked for food, and found nothing. She found a city dead of starvation, gates shut from titans but still dead.  
She spent the time refilling her tanks, and simply looking. She hunted outside the walls, in nearby villages, and while often other had already been there, she found enough food to survive. She went out at night, and killed any Titans she came across, like she had on her way to Wall Maria  
She felt defeated, in away. It had been a gamble, she’d known from the start. Still she’d been hoping to be right twice.  
One week later, she again stood at the top of the wall, back to Ilea. There were two other cities along the wall, two more chances. She hosted her bag up on her back, and smiled. Ester and Fayal.

She rushed through Ester with nary a second glance. Both gates were gaping open, with no sign of any soldiers. She only stopped to drop the gate, leaving a few titans trapped within the city. Perhaps the population had decided to flee outside the walls, she didn’t know. Beyond food there was nothing for her here.  
The air cooled as she ran northwards, and the landscape changed to huge evergreen forests. A jumper had blocked her path once, jumping from one of the huge trees branches straight onto the wall. By now, it was not difficult to kill. Melanie had euthanized enough of their kind.  
She came upon Fayal a full month after first setting out for wall Maria. Unlike both Ilea and Ester, she saw signs of life long before reaching the city itself. New contraptions littered the walls, the closer to the city the more. They looked like catapults of some kind. Melanie had to fight the urge to hide, knowing that unlike in the main walls, out here there were few enough people that a stranger would stand out.  
She walked her way along the wall, finding signs of old meals and human footprints, once even a cannon that was still warm from firing.  
“Hey!” A voice called, and Melanie found a soldier standing up from behind one of the catapults. She waved awkwardly. Titans did not good company make.  
“Who’re you? How’d you get up here?” He asked, and Melanie took note of his Garrison uniform and fit appearance.  
“I’m …” She stopped herself from giving him her real name, both old and new memories blocking the reflex.  
“My name is Kasha. I’m from Rose.”  
The man’s eyebrows rose into his hairline.  
“Rose, really? How’d you get out here?” She blinked and shrugged.  
“Luck, I’d guess.”  
The man nodded.  
“Did Rose fall as well?” She shook her head.  
“There was a food shortage, and in the end it was decided that sending out people to help kill titans would solve the problem.”  
The man blinked and shrugged.  
“To each their own, I suppose. We ended up resorting to both mass-training soldiers and cannibalism.” Melanie had to hide the reflexive shudder at the word cannibalism. Didn’t that slowly drive people mad?  
“Thank you for telling me.” Mass-murder wasn’t any better though. The man motioned for her to follow him.  
“My name is Kurt Heinrich. If I may ask, how old are you? And how good are you with the gear on your hips?”  
Melanie hid a frown at the question. Why did he want to know?  
“I’m nineteen, and alright I suppose, why?”  
The man gave another shrug.  
“We’ve gone pretty military to survive, and I wanted to know if you could be useful. You’re a little old to train after all.”  
She hid another shiver at the implications of that statement and followed the man down the wall and into the city itself.  
The streets were eerily empty, and frightened women and children boarded up windows at their approach. Kurt kept smiling, as if it was normal, and she had to wonder what exactly was meant with militarization.  
Kurt led her to a big building near the market square, where he bid her stay outside while he talked with someone inside. She took the time to unclasp her cloak and put it away into her pack.  
Kurt came back out a few minutes later, and beckoned her inside. He led her up some stairs and to a door which he knocked on.  
“Our commander.” He explained, before bowing and leaving her alone. Melanie tentatively opened the door, finding a greying woman bent over a pile of documents.  
“Hello?” She asked, uncomfortable with social customs after so many years in places where they were unnecessary.  
The woman looked up from her work and beckoned her to sit.  
“Kasha, correct? Supposedly from Wall Rose.” She nodded, and sat down on the chair she was motioned towards.  
“We are always happy to welcome more into our forces. Kurt told me the gear on your hips is more than just decoration. How are your hunting skills?”  
Melanie shook her head.  
“Nonexistent.”  
The woman frowned, but nodded.  
“I’ll assign you to the extermination corps.” She handed her a package of clothing.  
“This will do as a uniform. You will sleep in the barracks and eat in the mess hall. Kurt will show you.”

Her first few weeks were spent training with other recruits, all of which were no older than sixteen. Some were just about ten. She learnt the basics of hunting and martial combat, as well as some new tricks for 3DMG. After that, she would head out with other soldiers to exterminate titans at twilight, never staying out all night due to the aberrant that were active at night, and which the darkness made almost impossible to fight.  
The only reason she hadn’t met any on her mad race was that they were sluggish, and thus had been unable to follow her. Near Fayal, they made all but stationary targets.  
She’d gone out on her first free evening to find a gambling parlour, and hadn’t even found a pub. There were plenty of people out and about in the darkness, and she couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the eyes staring out at her from the shadows were too far down to be anything other than children.  
Living here wasn’t bad, she found. She was supplied with gas and food, as well as new uniforms and blades. There was a distinct lack of company, though, and a distinct lack of humans on the street.

The first time she saw someone culled was near the end of her second week. She’d known that the scouts and exterminators had orders to carry any casualties home with them, but this was new.  
A soldier had lost an arm on a hunt. He’d been sent to the commander after returning from the mission, and she’d been present to hear the disastrous questioning.  
“It says here that you have the shakes.” The man nodded.  
“You were a smith before joining the military, and can no longer do the job with only one arm. You have a bad history with horses.” The commander sighed.  
“I apologize, you already know the verdict. You have no close family, no current abilities to grant the community and we’re currently running out of food.” She handed him a gun and a box of painkillers.  
The man faithfully gulped the pills and then shot himself.  
One of the soldiers then walked up, and with one swing decapitated the corpse. The commander nodded.  
“You know the drill. Head to the grave and body to the processers.” Melanie stood still as the body was carried out, and then excused herself. She found a corner outside and promptly threw up.  
Perhaps the worst part of the entire ordeal was that none of her fellow soldiers shied from eating meat the following days. She’d known objectively before that the meat in Fayal was to some percent human, but it took until her trip to the mess the next day for that fact to hammer home.  
She starved herself for a week, before starting to eat again. She was going to live here, and that meant accepting even the customs that she couldn’t stomach. It took three weeks for her to stop throwing up. Still, she was desperately glad that no one attempted to make soldier food taste better that cardboard.

She began wandering at night, watching as slowly the eerie glowing eyes stopped retreating from her. She watched as they shied from others in the Fayal military uniform, similar as it was to that of the Walls. Only the crest was different, showing crossed lances instead of swords, and with a small head of Maria embroidered on the right shoulder.  
The Fayal military had seven branches, instead of the three of that of the walls.  
Scouts, Police and Garrison; also known as Wings, Unicorns and Roses.  
Exterminators, the meat corps, officially the Assassins, and the Gunners; represented by a circle, the head of a dog and a wrench.  
Finally, there were the City Corps, wearing Maria on their backs instead of the coat of arms. They were in charge of organization, of the horses, of all the small things none of the six branches could deal with. They made 3DMG, forged the blades, readied tanks, and a myriad of other small jobs.  
Fayal’s hunters were a mixed group. Some civilians, as well of a few from each of the main seven branches were members, and they wore dark green uniform.

Work continued in boring monotone, and it almost felt like being back home, after five full years of running she had finally found her goal, and it felt like peace. It was far from perfect, her days were highly irregular and she still felt sick from eating the food. The entire city was very military, and the police was brutal towards civilians, but she had a place to belong.  
One and a half months into her work here, she was moved out of the barracks and into a small apartment building. It was larger than her room, but seemed even lonelier than that had been.

She was in a meadow, red roses decorated the walls to her back, and before her was a huge expanse of free green. She walked forwards, fighting the instinctive fear that wanted to drive her backwards.  
There was a disturbance in the grass, a spot branded black, and by the time she saw what it was, her feet refused to stop moving. Three rings surrounding tiny model houses, with tiny humans screaming as her foot crashed through the first wall. Her next step broke the entirety of Sina and she found herself falling.  
It was black as pitch, and she couldn’t move even as something huge picked her up. She would recognize those thundering steps anywhere.  
“Hello, how are you?” A snide voice asked, and her eyes snapped open and she found herself staring at the huge distorted face of a man she had last seen almost a full twenty years ago. Then lines zipped and a flying windmill cut his head off.  
“You know the drill. Head to the grave and body to the meat house.” Something thunked into the back of her head, and she collapsed onto the ground.   
“Head to the grave and body to the meat house.” She knew that voice.  
She sat up heaving in bed, sweat pouring down her body.  
Armin.  
Thoughts she’d been suppressing for so long rose in her head, memories of a small blond boy with shining eyes staring up at her as she talked of the Himalayas and how rivers formed. Memories of Eren pulling the blonde out of a titan’s mouth. Memories of the fall of wall Maria, and the fall of Shinganshina that she shouldn’t have.  
She’d said she’d meet them on wall Maria. She forced the thoughts out of her mind and pulled on her Uniform. She was going out.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Again, last one for a while

“Um, do you have some food?” A timid voice asked, and Melanie spun around to find a small brown haired boy tugging at her jacket.  
“Hans!” a voice hissed out of the shadows, and an older boy emerged, scowling at the boy while shooting fearful glances her way.  
“Leave the soldier alone!”  
Hans turned wide eyes towards the other boy.  
“But she’s the outsider!” The other boy scowled harder.  
“She’s still a soldier!”  
She gently pulled the younger boy’s hand from her uniform.  
“I don’t have any food.” The boy looked crestfallen, and something stirred inside her.  
“… but I might have some tomorrow.”  
The older boy stalked away from the shadows and hugged Hans.  
“What do you want in return?”  
Melanie looked at the two boys, and swallowed a lump.  
“I want you to listen to me for an hour.” The older boy was visibly surprised.  
“That’s it?” She nodded.  
“Well, I’d also like your name.”  
The older boy grit his teeth and scowled.  
“It’s Jonas.”

There were two small cots in her apartment now. The boys only rarely used them, and usually only came round when she had food – which was only on those days she could afford to go without. Something about the two stirred her heart, in a way nothing she could remember ever had. She smiled as they came rushing in, cheering when they saw the two plates on her kitchen table.  
“So, have I told you about Snow white and the seven dwarfs yet?” Mutual head shakes. She smiled. “Alright. Once, a long time ago, when Titans were still figments in the minds of the crazy, in a kingdom twice the size of wall Maria, there lived a King, and his Queen. They wanted a child more than anything in this world. It so happened that one day a fairy sat hidden under a large leaf, hiding from the snow in winter, and close to the window the Queen leaned out of to sew. The Queen was ore distracted and despondent than usual, and slipped while sewing and drops of red decorated the snow. She was struck by the beauty of the scene and sighed. ‘If only I had a child’ she whispered to the wind, and the small fairy hidden under the leaf. ‘Let it have skin as white as snow, lips as red as my blood and hair as black as the mahogany of my window.’  
That night the queen had a dream.  
‘Give me your life,’ a soft voice called, ‘and I will give you the most beautiful daughter ever seen. Answer my trade by the next full moon, and your wish will be granted.’  
The Queen told her husband of the dream, omitting only the cost, and soon the next full moon rose above the snowy garden.  
‘Yes’ the queen prayed with all her heart. ‘Give me a child, even if it is at the cost of my own life.’  
Winter faded into spring, and spring into summer, and while the Royal doctor proclaimed her pregnant, he also proclaimed her deathly ill.  
The King spent much time at his wife’s side, clasping her hand and whispering encouraging words. He neglected court at the same time, and it lead to the rise of a beauty the like of which had never been seen before. She became powerful, and by the time his daughter was finally born, and his wife died, he had no recourse but to marry her to keep both his position and give his child a mother.” As she spoke, they listened intently, and suddenly a different face flashed before her eyes.  
“The new Queen however, was not as she seemed, and while she was kind, she was also vain and proud, and very very clever. In her possession was a mirror, one capable of seeing truth beyond that of any human.  
‘Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who is the most beautiful of them all?’ she asked it every morning and every night, and it always answered ‘You, my queen’ …”

The executioners were on their way back from hunting inside Maria when a huge shadow made Melanie stop her horse dead in its tracks.  
The huge ape turned its large head towards the incoming fighters, uncaring of the fact that it was night and it should have been sleeping, because of course it wasn’t. Shifters didn’t need sunlight. Melanie felt her teeth clench together harder than ever. Something cracked.  
“What’s up, Kasha?” Her partner asked her and she swallowed a swear, head reeling. Had she lost track of time? Why would the beast titan attack if the Shifters had a reliable way to break down walls? Had Trost already fallen?  
She kicked her horse into gear, refusing to see her home destroyed again. Once, she had fourteen years to accept it as fact, this time she refused to accept. She’d been here two months, and even if she still couldn’t swallow food, if the place had customs that freaked her out, Fayal was home to people she cared about, god knows why. Jonas and Hans might have reminded her of Moritz and Franz and the beginning, reminded her of her brothers, but they were her people now, important to her like many others were. She’d starved for those two, and she refused to watch them turn into Titans.  
“Kasha!” She heard her partner shout behind her, but she ignored it, hands on the eject lever of her 3DMG. Fayal was rising fast in front of her, but she didn’t bother waiting for the gates to open, instead aiming her cable anchors as high up the wall as she could, and then zooming up.  
She scrambled to the top of the wall, and broke into a run straight for the beast. When a familiar face came running past, she grabbed Kurt’s shoulder.  
“Evacuate to Ester!” She started running without waiting for an answer. Below, in the streets, the first humans were curling up in pain as they grew uncontrollably. Melanie just ran on towards the Beast.  
Her cables smashed into its nose, and her hands gripped her swords tightly. Spinning, she twined her cords together, before force recalling her cables, making her spin like a sharp demented top.  
The hand that tried to catch her promptly lost a full set of fingers and she crashed into its nose face first. She wasted no time, unanchoring the cables and dropping into freefall, before reaiming the anchors for the things eyes. They hit, and hands grabbed the cables, aiming to pull her up to be squished. She fumbled with the latches, finally dropping the entire gear and landing on the wall with a sword in each hand and empty hips.  
Running forwards, zigzagging to evade the second hand, she slipped under its head and stabbed both swords deep into the thing’s neck. She had to drop when hands headed her way, but the Titan’s hand just shoved the swords in deeper.  
She hadn’t hit the spine, hadn’t landed a killing blow, but with a shifter hitting any other body part also hurt. Thankfully its hands were too big to pull the blades out of its body, and every try just shoved them in deeper when the healing ability tried to push them out.  
Sadly, Shifters were intelligent, so she’d only bought a little time.  
A nearby soldier swept her up as the titan pushed her off the wall, and dumped her on the ground.  
“Help with the evac, Soldier! Leave the Titan to those of us with gear!”

She could find Jonas and Hans nowhere. Finally, when the last of the soldiers had climbed the wall and the long trek for Ester was already underway, she had to give up. Melanie Alert sat on her horse, staring out at the deceptively peaceful nature on both sides of the gate and thought.  
She had been hoping the Shifters would ignore the small pockets of humanity left in Wall Maria, but she’d been wrong. The Beast had hit Fayal, and there was no guarantee it wouldn’t hit Ester once they had moved there. Melanie felt hopeless.  
According to Canon, Trost would fall sometime in the next few weeks. A few months after that Rose would fall, and who knows when Sina would fall after that. She’d been running, and for a long time now, from the realities of living in Attack on Titan.  
So many people had died already, people she cared about. She’d abandoned her last family member for a moment of peace, had been unwilling to fight for a world a large part of her still felt wasn’t hers.  
A horse trotted up next to her.  
“Kasha?” She looked up, to find the Commander of the Fayal military riding beside her.  
“I was wondering if you would be willing to take one last mission from your commander.” The elderly woman had bandages wrapped around her left shoulder and torso, and would never be able to fight again.  
“What do you need from me?” The woman smiled a sad smile.  
“We had hoped to be safe, had figured out how we could stay alive, had hoped the fall of Maria was a one-time thing that would be solved by those in the inner walls. I am the commander of a broken military, of a band of refugees. Of us all, you are the only one who had a clue what to do once that beast arrived.”  
She raised a hand to stop me from speaking.  
“You come from the walls, of course you have secrets – I’m not going to chastise you for that. However, I saw that Titan turn humans into Titans. The implications alone …” She shook her head.  
“Kasha, my last order to you is to ride back to Wall Rose, and inform the Military of everything that happened in Fayal. We won’t be able to survive for much longer out here alone, and I am loath to let our last act be one of capitulation.”  
Melanie could feel her head sinking. Heading back to Wall Rose, confronting the people she knew from memories a lifetime past. Did she want to do that? She shook her head. No, that wasn’t what she was going to do. She was Melanie Alert, cousin to Armin Alert, nothing more and nothing less. She had no information from life times past in her head. She was Wire, she was Mouse, and she was Kasha of the Fayal Exterminator Corps, adoptive sister to Jonas and Hans. She had to remember who she was. Somehow she had been given a second chance; she had lived past ’45. She had been running from responsibility for five years now.  
A weak smile spread itself on her face, still slightly shaky. She sat up straight, head up, and looked at the woman beside her.  
“May I have your name then?” The woman laughed.  
“Erica Braus.”  
Melanie saluted for the first time in her life.  
“Erica Braus, Commander of the Fayal Military and leader of one of the toughest bastions of humanity, future leader of the Migrants of Ester, I accept your order, as long as it isn’t your last.” Her smile became a little more genuine.  
“You pulled a city together in the apocalypse, ma’am. There’s a lot more to leading than just fighting.”  
She chuckled a little. “Just let me say goodbye to some people.”  
She pushed forwards through the crowd until she rode next to Kurt.  
“Yo. I’m leaving.” Kurt raised a sad eyebrow, eyes haunted. Melanie smiled.  
“The commander decided to send me as an Envoy to the central walls. I’m saying goodbye for now.” Seeing his expression, she smiled wryly.  
“This world is rough, Kurt, and it only ever gets rougher. The end is close though, you just have to believe me.” She didn’t look back, just rode forward and nodded towards her partner. They weren’t particularly close, she and him.  
“I’m off on a mission.” His eyebrows rose.  
“Now?” She nodded. He shrugged.  
“Ok. Stay alive.” She smirked.  
“No promises.”


End file.
